tagged w/ mountaintop mining
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RICHMOND, VA- A couple of hundred people braved cold rain to light candles in memory of dozens of miners who have perished while working in mines owned by Massey Energy. The vigil was held the night before a Massey stockholders meeting on May 18.
Members of the United Mine Workers of America and other unions, relatives of the fallen and community members prayed for the dead and read the names of 52 workers who have died in the last ten years at Massey mines. In April of this year, 29 miners died at the Upper Big Branch mine in West Virginia, a mine that had been cited for more than 500 safety violations in the months leading up to the tragedy.
Speakers at the vigil called for accountability for those responsible at Massey Energy, especially CEO Don Blankenship, a notoriously anti-union executive. Protests the next day planned to call on stockholders to vote Blankenship out of office.RICHMOND, VA- A couple of hundred people braved cold rain to light candles in memory... more
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By Sarah Laskow, Media Consortium Blogger
President Barack Obama announced this week that his administration would open areas from Delaware to Florida and in Alaska to offshore drilling for gas and oil. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Department of Transportation also released new guidelines for auto emissions to cut carbon emissions, and the EPA said new benchmarks for issuing mountaintop mining permits would prevent damage to waterways in Appalachia. The environmental community welcomed these last two announcements but both were overshadowed by the off-shore drilling decision, which green groups largely condemned.
Off-putting off-shore drilling decision
Although as a candidate President Obama began by opposing off-shore drilling, by the end of the campaign he said he would support an expansion of drilling areas. Mother Jones’ Kate Sheppard explains the series of decisions that made this week’s announcement possible:
“In October 2008, amidst calls of “drill, baby, drill” from conservatives, Congress failed to renew the long-standing moratorium on offshore drilling. Months earlier, George W. Bush had lifted an 18-year-old executive ban on offshore drilling, which had originally been imposed by his father in 1990. Obama, of course, could have issued his own order, but didn’t.”
The administration had been considering the decision to go ahead with drilling for about a year but kept deliberations quiet. Key senators, however, knew the decision was coming, and it’s pushing Democrats like Sens. Mary Landrieu (D-LA) and Mark Warner (D-VA) to warm towards energy legislation, TPMDC reports.
Cars’ carbon emission
The EPA’s announcement on auto emissions, on the other hand, comes as no surprise. It marks the first big step the Obama administration has taken to limit carbon emissions through regulation. Auto regulations are a relatively easy sell. A chunk of Congress wants to keep the EPA from taking these sorts of actions, but in this case, the auto industry supports the federal regulations. At the Washington Independent, Aaron Wiener notes that “the guidelines drew immediate praise from the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, which has long advocated national emissions and efficiency regulations rather than patchwork state-by-state rules.”
Mountaintop removal mining
The coal industry will be less happy about the EPA’s announcement on mountaintop removal mining. The agency admitted that the practice causes significant damage to streams and said its new guidelines would lead to significantly less harm.
The new policies, Jeff Biggers writes at AlterNet, will “effectively bring an end to the process of valley fills (and the dumping of toxic coal mining waste into the valleys and waterways).” It could be, he says, “the beginning of the end of mountaintop removal.”
One sign that mountaintop removal’s doomsday is nigh? Sen. Robert Byrd (D-WV), one of coal’s staunchest and most powerful advocates on the Hill, praised the EPA’s decision, reports Mike Lillis at the Washington Independent.
Green groups groan
Green groups are lauding the EPA’s two announcements. (The Sierra Club called the mining announcement “the most significant administrative action ever taken to address mountaintop removal coal mining,” for instance.) But the push for off-shore drilling has environmental advocates squirming.
“As the president extends olive branches to his critics, he’s alienating allies in the environmental community, who say his policies are reminding them more and more of those of his predecessor, George W. Bush,” says Mother Jones’ Sheppard. “Some enviros are even likening Obama to Alaska’s oil-loving ex-governor, Sarah Palin.”
On Democracy Now!, Brendan Cummings of the Center for Biological Diversity, called the decision “horribly disappointing” and said, “Obama is essentially embracing wholeheartedly the policy of: we can drill our way to energy independence.”
The Obama administration’s energy and environmental policy is creeping ever further towards the center. Ken Salazar, Secretary for the Interior, said this week that “Cap-and-trade is not in the lexicon anymore,” TPMDC reports. It’s no wonder that progressive members of Congress are starting to feel uncomfortable with the direction their climate bill is taking, as Sheppard reports. The president may be using up his reserves of political support from his allies as he stretches to meet conservatives and centrist Democrats on some shaky middle ground.
This post features links to the best independent, progressive reporting about the environment by members of The Media Consortium. It is free to reprint. Visit the Mulch for a complete list of articles on environmental issues, or follow us on Twitter. And for the best progressive reporting on critical economy, health care and immigration issues, check out The Audit, The Pulse, and The Diaspora. This is a project of The Media Consortium, a network of leading independent media outlets.By Sarah Laskow, Media Consortium Blogger
President Barack Obama announced this... more
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1. Your tax dollars at work… in Obamastan
2. A cum blast from the past
3. Future crimes today
4. The Winter Olympigs
5. Worldwide Resistance Report
6. Ska-P
7. Ward Churchill deconcstruct’s Obama’s Cairo speech1. Your tax dollars at work… in Obamastan
2. A cum blast from the past
3.... more
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Well here I am at the University of Charleston where Robert Kennedy, Jr. and Don Blankenship have just finished a one and a half hour debate. I hope you tuned in via the live stream or the RAN tweet feed, we’ll have photos posted soon to our RAN flickr account.
Its been a lively evening for sure. Massey called in the reinforcements by way of a Friends of Coal rally, however the rain seemed to dampen the turnout. UC President Ed Welch moderated the event which was attended by over 950 people. By the time Kennedy and Blankenship took the stage, the auditorium was standing room only.
Welch opened the event by saying “Tonight we are going to try to recapture that art of argument. ” He reiterated his intent to “Get beyond talking points” and get the participants to engage in a real conversation with each other rather than rehearsed sound bites. They certainly accomplished the art of disagreeing, but Welch wasn’t able to throw any questions too tough to throw these two off their game.
Both RFK and Blankenship appeared well rehearsed for the evening, opening comments were given before diving into topics of job loss, global warming, viability of reclamation, potential for transition to alternative energy, and energy independence.
After a coin toss the first question went to Blankenship, which allowed him to aire concerns of prosperity for this country and security, both of which in his opinion are solved by coal.
Bobby began by pointing out that these companies are “liquidating this state for cash”. Maybe that’s what Don meant by prosperity. But Bobby did not only point the finger to the profits of coal companies like Massey Coal, but also to the financiers of this industry such as JP Morgan Chase. He raised issues of poverty associated with communities closest to MTR sites repeatedly, however Don couldn’t seem to grasp this correlation.
Certainly one of my favorite parts of the evening was when Don held up a clear bottle of water to make a point that this is the water “we” are fighting to clean up. Suffice it to say he didn’t mistake this water for his drinking glass- water which he claims is discharge from a mine that failed EPA testing. Unfortunately, much of the water in areas where surface mining is practiced is laden with toxic heavy metals like selenium, often resulting in a brackish orange color and completely unsuitable for consumption.
You can imagine the responses when Welch brought up global warming, especially given Blankenship’s previous claims that “Global warming is a hoax and a ponzi scheme.” Bobby prefaced the conversation by pointing out that neither he nor Blankenship are scientists and therefore they should rely on the science that does exist on climate change. He pointed out that 98% of scientists agree that global warming is happening, “2% disagree, some of them- not all of them are paid by Exxon and the carbon cronies. I have a choice to believe the 98 or the 2 percent.”
Blankenship’s retort was that the real issue is whether global warming is manmade, which, according to him “its clearly not. Its all totally nonsensical.” Better yet, he went on to say that regardless of what the climate is going to do, “there isn’t anything we can do about it.” Well I guess we should all just quit already and go sun tan on the beach.
READ MORE AT LINKWell here I am at the University of Charleston where Robert Kennedy, Jr. and Don... more
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In light of last week's EPA ruling giving the go ahead to another mountaintop removal coal mine, and the subsequent report from a group of eminent scientists saying, in essence, that no remediation is ever enough to repair the damage mountaintop mining causes, it's worth reminding people that it's not just coal companies that stand to profit from the practice. Banks like JPMorgan Chase also are making a pretty penny from destroying Appalachia, as Gloria Reuben points out in an op-ed for Huffington Post:
Environmental & Social Destruction Funded
In the past two decades alone, mountaintop removal coal mining has destroyed roughly 470 mountains in the region. The debris from these blasts is dumped into surrounding valleys, destroying what were once serene and lush hollows. Or it's dumped into local rivers and streams, literally burying 1,200 miles of waterways.
Communities are decimated, as poverty has driven families out, leaving ghost towns where there used to be thriving homes, schools and businesses. Many who refuse to leave, because their families have been there for generations--or who are stuck in the vicious cycle of accepting very little, because they've been left with nothing--lead lives that are filled with high rates of cancer, asthma and other life-threatening illnesses. And they are witness to friends and loved ones who succumb to premature death.
So how does JPMorgan Chase profit from this? By funding six of the eight companies responsible for mountaintop removal coal mining, including $1 billion to Massey Energy, the largest MTR mining company.
Chase's Rhetoric Better Than Actions
Bank of America and Wells Fargo have severed ties with Massey, so why not Chase?
After all, Chase touts including environmental practices into their sustainable business model, but apparently fails to see the disconnect between that and funding practices and companies which continually destroy mountains and pollute rivers.In light of last week's EPA ruling giving the go ahead to another mountaintop... more
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A new study published in the journal Science says mountaintop mining should be banned. A team of 12 ecologists, hydrologists, and engineers say it causes vast and permanent destruction to the environment and exposes people to serious health consequences, including lung cancer, and chronic heart, lung and kidney disease, as well as birth defects. The article provides the most comprehensive analysis so far of the damage done by the controversial mining practice.A new study published in the journal Science says mountaintop mining should be banned.... more
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Scientific evidence that mountaintop-removal coal mining destroys streams and threatens human health is so strong that government should stop granting new permits for it, a group of 12 environmental scientists report in Friday's issue of the journal Science.
The consequences of this mining in eastern Kentucky , West Virginia and southwestern Virginia are "pervasive and irreversible," the article finds. Companies are required by law to take steps to reduce the damages, but their efforts don't compensate for lost streams nor do they prevent lasting water pollution, it says.
The article is a summary of recent scientific studies of the consequences of blasting the tops off mountains to obtain coal and dumping the excess rock into streams in valleys. The authors also studied new water-quality data from West Virginia streams and found that mining polluted them, reducing their biological health and diversity.
Surprisingly little attention has been paid to this growing scientific evidence of the damages, they wrote, adding: "Regulators should no longer ignore rigorous science."
New permits shouldn't be granted, they argued, "unless new methods can be subjected to rigorous peer review and shown to remedy these problems."
The Science article cites a number of potential health risks from removing mountaintops and filling in valleys, including contaminated well water, toxic dust and fish that are tainted with the chemical selenium. It also looked at environmental damage to the mining and fill areas and to streams below them.
READ MORE AT LINK...Scientific evidence that mountaintop-removal coal mining destroys streams and... more
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A list of suspects that destroyed an ecosystem and poisoned their people.
Since at least 2002, the DEP has listed Dunkard Creek and several tributaries as "biologically impaired." At least two major coal discharges have consistently violated water quality limits -- sometimes discharging five or six times the legal standards -- for years.
West Virginia DNR search for remaining fish in Dunkard Creek turned up only one white sucker at a site in Mason-Dixon Historical Park.A list of suspects that destroyed an ecosystem and poisoned their people.
Since at... more
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Words alone can’t describe what mountaintop mining is doing to Appalachia, its streams and the lives of its people.
Coal companies have dynamited more than 470 mountaintops and pushed the debris into valleys, burying hundreds of miles of streams and contaminating the water with metals such as nickel, lead, cadmium, iron and selenium.
From those bare expanses, the mining companies strip out the coal and then move on to the next mountain. The treeless landscapes, meanwhile, can create dangerous flash flooding for nearby residents, and the mining debris can render their well water undrinkable.
In a new 20-minute documentary produced by Yale Environment 360 and MediaStorm, Chad Stevens takes his video camera inside the community meetings, homes and offices of the people on both sides of the front lines, capturing their emotions and letting them tell the story. ...Words alone can’t describe what mountaintop mining is doing to Appalachia, its... more
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Mountaintop removal is a controversial type of coal mining in Appalachia. Here are some voices for and against it.Mountaintop removal is a controversial type of coal mining in Appalachia. Here are... more
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Bank of America is particularly concerned about surface mining conducted through mountain top removal in locations such as central Appalachia. We therefore will phase out financing of companies whose predominant method of extracting coal is through mountain top removal. While we acknowledge that surface mining is economically efficient and creates jobs, it can be conducted in a way that minimizes environmental impacts in certain geographies.
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No it doesn't create jobs, deep mining employees more people.Bank of America is particularly concerned about surface mining conducted through... more
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In the first ever nationwide poll on mountaintop removal mining, two out of three Americans opposed recent efforts by the Bush administration to repeal the Stream Buffer Zone rule, which prohibits mining within 100 feet of streams. The Stream Buffer Zone rule is the last remaining legal impediment to mountaintop removal coal mining, which has already devastated much of Appalachia. Concern about the harmful impacts of mountaintop removal mining and attempts to roll back environmental protections for quick, cheap energy production spread across regional, partisan and educational divides.
In the first ever nationwide poll on mountaintop removal mining, two out of three... more
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"President Bush is poised to issue regulations that will permit and encourage mountaintop mining, a controversial practice in which the tops of mountains are blasted off and dumped in nearby valleys.""President Bush is poised to issue regulations that will permit and encourage... more
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